During his career with the Padres, Jake Peavy was actually a pretty durable pitcher. Starting with his first full season in 2003, up to his trade to the White Sox in 2009, Peavy had made at least 30 starts in all but two seasons, when he logged 27 in both 2004 and 2008. When the White Sox acquired Peavy at the 2009 trade deadline, he had only made 13 starts for the Padres. Since that 2009 trade, Peavy has made a grand total of 25 starts on the south side.
The latest setback came on Sunday against the Tigers, when Peavy was pulled after four innings. It was announced yesterday that he would be placed on the DL today with a groin strain. It’s not a major injury that will require surgery, which has happened many times over his White Sox career, but it is yet another misstep in a series of them for the former Cy Young winner.
When is it time for the White Sox to just back far away from Peavy? The horrible part about this for Chicago is that Peavy has a contract. Specifically, a contract that runs through 2012 (when he’ll be paid $17 million). They can’t just outright cut him and be on the hook for that amount. But with as much as Peavy has been hurt over his White Sox career, you need to look at dumping his contract onto another team. He’s making $16 million this year, and has a $4 million buyout for his option in 2013. That’s somewhere in the neighborhood of $30 million that the team still owes Peavy. It’s absolute madness.
The White Sox are a team saddled with crappy contracts. In addition to Peavy’s deal, the team owes Alex Rios somewhere in the neighborhood of $45 million until 2015. Paul Konerko was signed this offseason to a three year, $37.5 million deal that could be looking ugly in the coming years. Oh, and there’s also the fact that Kenny Williams handed the struggling (that’s an understatement) Adam Dunn a four year deal worth $56 million this past offseason.
The team is absolutely hamstrung by it’s payroll right now, and it all started with that Peavy traded two seasons ago. Chicago has nearly $95 million already budgeted towards its 2012 payroll. That puts them in a ballpark with Philadelphia ($112 million), New York ($153 million) and Boston ($126 million). The difference is that those teams are at the top of the standings, while the White Sox are consistently mediocre. With the way their payroll looks right now, it could be awhile before they’re sniffing the top of their division, especially if their older players start to show their age.
